True Blood: Season 5, Episode 11–Sunset

“Jason and Sookie and the inhabitants of Bon Temps are no longer our concern. They are food, nothing more.”

With the end almost in sight, the few remaining separate plot strands of True Blood’s fifth season have finally intersected, losing that rather meandering feel it’s had a lot of the time this year. With the vampire Authority’s newfound religious fervour now impacting on all walks of society, it could hardly have been otherwise. But more specifically, the only other major plot thread that had remained separate – the Bon Temps fairies and Sookie’s quest for the answers about her parents’ death – is now directly linked to the vampire plotline, as the deranged Russell Edgington is on a determined quest for some fairy blood to enable him to walk in daylight.

This was a fast-moving episode, as plot twist followed plot twist. I’m going to have to swallow my earlier scepticism about Bill’s religious conversion – it seems he really is a true believer. Pam provided something of an explanation for this, as “nesting behaviour”. Apparently when vampires live together and feed together in a nest , they lose their ‘humanity’ becoming something altogether more monstrous and cruel. The explanation, if a little convenient, was necessary, as Bill’s current behaviour seems to fly in the face of what has previously been established about his character. Then again, the Sanguinistas qualify as a cult – and cults have ways of persuading their believers. Bill’s enforced isolation in the Authority’s underground HQ, and the narcotic effects of Lilith’s blood, certainly seem reminiscent of some cults’ brainwashing techniques.

Anyway, enough of making excuses for Bill. Thankfully, Eric really was feigning his ‘blinding light on the road to Damascus’ moment, and what’s more, the vision of Godric has finally persuaded Nora that she’s on the wrong path too. Luckily for them, the Authority think they’re both true believers, enabling them to leave the underground base after Eric’s seemingly reckless murder of a senior Army General. Once out, ostensibly on a quest to clean the trail that led from that murder to the Authority, they were free to messily slaughter the Authority’s handlers/bodyguards and disappear into the night, in a scene nicely underscored with Mozart’s Requiem.

The appearance of General Cavanaugh nicely filled in some backstory gaps about the whole ‘going public’ thing that vampires have done in the True Blood universe. It seems that the Authority have been negotiating with human authorities for decades, with former head honcho Roman having given assurances directly to the president of the US about future vampire behaviour. This makes sense – for such a seismic social event as revealing the existence of supernatural beings to the human world, a fair amount of groundwork would have to be laid.

That the General now feels the need to personally visit the Authority (a pretty bad idea, as it turned out) is because the human governments know that they’re behind the bombing of the Tru Blood factories, and the resultant shift back to vampires hunting humans. And as I’d theorised previously, the humans are more than prepared for such an eventuality. Not that Cavanaugh’s threats of new weapons and using footage of Russell and Steve to turn the public against vampires did him personally much good. At first glance, Eric breaking his neck looked like a damn silly thing to do, given that it was pretty much the first shot in an official war. But then, the war was on its way anyway, and Eric’s just hastened the endgame. Plus, it gave him the aforementioned opportunity to finally slip the Authority’s clutches and work against them.

This may prove less difficult than it first seemed, as cracks are starting to appear in the unity of the Sanguinistas’ religious devotion. Not only has Russell turned heretic and fled the nest, now various different Chancellors (firstly Bill) are being plagued by visions of Lilith herself, telling them that she’s chosen each to be the one true Leader, and that he/she should consume all that is left of her blood.

This is plainly not going to end well. Bill has already beheaded one rival, and perhaps the realisation that he’s not the only one to have such visions might finally break the spell that vampire religion has him under. But it also makes one wonder why Lilith would act so counter-productively to her own revolution. We’re still not sure if the ‘visions’ of her are any more than just hallucinations induced by the narcotic effects of her powerful blood. But if they are more than that, and given that the disunity and potential exhaustion of her last remaining blood seem sure to pretty much destroy the new fundamentalist Authority, I’m betting that these ‘visions’ aren’t Lilith at all. In fact, I’m wondering if next week will see the revelation that it’s actually Godric under the skin of that bloodsoaked female form…

Meanwhile, other characters are being drawn into the Authority’s clutches, even as Eric and Nora finally break free. Sam and Luna are already in, having disguised themselves as mice to try and recover the kidnapped Emma. Unfortunately for them, just as they find her (while in their human form), Authority guards turn up and make the assumption that they’ve escaped from the larder. Sam makes the interesting choice to volunteer as Bill Compton’s lunch; perhaps he can succeed in talking some sense back into ol’ tall, dark and undead before it’s too late…

And on his way up, he bumps into Pam, being hustled into a cell for the murder of irritating goth vampire Elijah. Pam’s taken the fall for Tara here, and again we see that beneath the snarky, bitchy exterior is someone who does have loyalty to her friends – even if she won’t ever admit she has any. I’ve enjoyed the way Pam’s been given so much screen time this year, and particularly loved her double act with Tara, whose vampirisation has given her previously tired character a new lease of life. Let’s hope that next week’s finale won’t be the end of her.

Or indeed of Jason, having served as bait in a trap set by the fairies for Russell Edgington. Having evaded Jessica’s faux-attempt to vampirise him (with her sly help), he now knows the deal with the Authority, and what Russell’s planning. Unfortunately for Sookie, his revelation of the news served to prematurely cut short her meeting with the fairy elder who seems to know the truth about the mysterious ‘Warlow’.

The elder was marvellously cryptic, existing on a “different plane” due to her immense age. In practice, this meant that she constantly danced around while frequently diverting the topic of conversation to whether Sookie liked various pop acts, including Kesha, Boyz II Men and John Mellencamp. Her erratic weirdness was nicely reminiscent of characters such as Delirium from Neil Gaiman’s Sandman comics, although weird and cryptic beings of supernatural power are hardly a new idea.

Nevertheless, she was fun, so it’s a shame that Russell, having glamoured Jason into taking him and Steve to the fairy field, despatched her so quickly. Or did he? I wonder if it’s all part of her plan, and her apparent death will serve some suitably cryptic purpose of which Sookie and the other fairies are not yet aware.

They’d better hope so, because Russell, chock full of fairy blood, can now see their refuge and it’s a fair bet that he can get in too. Denis O’Hare’s performance as Russell this week was as marvellously full-throated OTT as ever – an actor who’s capable of subtlety elsewhere, he’s sensibly discarded it for the grand guignol excesses of this show. But having served as major villain twice over now, it would seems sensible for him to be properly killed off next week, lest the show become repetitive in its choice of opponents as so many long-running comic series do.

This penultimate episode had the feeling of a chess match, as the showrunner moved the various pieces into the necessary places for next week’s endgame. For me, that’s a better choice than last year, when all the plots seemed concluded in the penultimate episode and the finale served as a kind of epilogue. I’m expecting some serious action next week, as creator Alan Ball finally bows out as showrunner – let’s hope he goes out on a high.

2 thoughts on “True Blood: Season 5, Episode 11–Sunset”

That a really well-written, insightful and well rationalized description of the last episode, dude. With most recaps lazily regurgitating the HBO metadata verbatim, you provided a nice, entertainment and thought-provoking analysis. Well done!

I agree with the previous commenter, I always enjoy coming to read your reviews of each episode immediately after watching them. It’s also cool you cover quite a few of the same shows I watch, e.g. Being Human, Game of Thrones. If you started reviewing Breaking Bad it would pretty much cover all my favourite tv! 😛